Charlotte Meehan

The Six Elements, by René Magritte, 1928

Concert performance for CD (first movement)
directed by Christine Säng
Sound design by Elliott Mazzola

View specs and second movement

Listen to CD

Random sources and inspirations:

Jacques Derrida

by P. Hal Sims, 1935

Man in Jacques Derrida t-shirt

My high school religion book

Gérard de Nerval, my hero

A guilty pleasure

by Robert J. Stoller, 1974

GOD
(stands up)
What is sloth?

(During the following response, GOD, overcome with fatigue, flops back down on his chaise lounge.)

CHORUS OF YOUNG MEN

Sloth is laziness of mind and body which causes one to neglect his duties.

SECOND CHORUS MEMBER

Tell us a story, Daddy. Please?

GOD

There was a calf; that’s half.
There was a wall; that’s all.

SALLY

(playing with her fingers in the air)
love love love love love

THIRD CHORUS MEMBER

She saw the moon!
She saw the moon!
She saw the moon!

MADAME ETIQUETTE

Oh dear, you dreamed it.
It was only a dream.

SALLY

fall down fall down fall down
down down down down down
to the ground

FIRST CHORUS MEMBER

She can’t smile.
She can’t talk.
She can’t dream.

SALLY

don’t dream don’t dream don’t dream no no no no
she she she she
he he he he
who who who who

CHORUS OF YOUNG MEN

In the smallness of this world
In the smallness of this world
In the small small smallness of this world

Bleu I, by Joan Miró, 1962

I began writing this piece during a tumultuous time of loss and at the beginning of a great love. Only Jacques Derrida's anti-conclusive world view could console me at the time. There are three distinct movements and I was writing the third while studying with Charles Mee at Brown University in 1999. He told me to hold onto love in that movement. I did and remain forever grateful to him for that.

This piece has had numerous concert readings under Christine Säng's direction, among them: Dixon Place, The Writer's Voice of the West Side Y, The Flea Theater, La MaMa La Galleria, and Perishable Theatre (as part of Brown University's New Plays Festival).

René Magritte, 1928-29